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Dominica Lifts
Dominica Lifts (commonly abbreviated to '''DL) is a generic elevator company that was founded in 1981, and manufacture & install elevators and escalators all over Planet Elevator and Econesia. They are currently the biggest third-party/generic lift company in Planet Elevator. Despite being generic, their elevators are actually pretty reasonable and reliable. History & fixtures used 1980’s Dominica Lifts was founded in 1981 under the name “Dominica Lift Services Ltd”. They didn’t have any logo or icon. DL only manufactured hydraulic elevators back then, for buildings with 5 floors or less. They used various generic dot-matrix and/or segmented indicators (despite being generic, they’re still better than any modern generic indicator), and Dewhurst buttons specifically made for Dominica Lifts, called Dewhurst US81-DL. These are Dewhurst US81 buttons with a lamp in the top right corner, and Eurostile font for the button engraving. Some elevators—especially ones made before 1986—even had a bell chime (2-stage bell chime similar to that of older Fujitec, OTIS, Toshiba etc). 1990’s (–present) Dominica Lifts removed the “Services” from their name, and became known as “Dominica Lifts Ltd”. They still didn’t have a proper logo. They now also manufactured elevators for mid-to-high-rise buildings, and introduced a hall call prediction feature. In elevators with this feature, the chime will ding once when the call button is pressed, and ding twice when the elevator has arrived. The bell chimes were now reserved for these high-rise installations, and a new electronic chime that sounds similar to that of Mitsubishi & Hitachi elevators were introduced for low-rise/hydraulic installations. New button designs were also introduced — the ones they used in the present day! These buttons are lozenge-shaped black buttons with a green lamp in the top right corner. Because of this, these buttons double up as vandal-resistant buttons, and thus Dominica Lifts elevators can also be installed in places like car parks and train stations. Up until today, the 1990’s high-rise model can still be installed upon the building owners’ request. 2000’s–present A massive revamp in design for Dominica Lifts! They dropped the "Ltd." in their official name in 2010, and now have new generic-looking 5×7 dot-matrix indicators, and LCD computer display indicators. The LCD indicators have a big arrow on the top (green for up, and pink/red for down), and the floor number in the middle. The indicator font is usually Arial, but some indicators can use the Univers font (rare). A lot of new modernisations done by Schindler with generic fixtures (particularly 5500 mods, or 6500) use similar-style indicators. The lozenge-shaped buttons are still in use, however a touch-sensitive variant was released. This type of button has a green halo around the button instead of a tiny green lamp. This touch-sensitive variant is not very commonly seen. Sometimes the design is even used as a push button for many modernisations from KONE M-Series as a lookalike button (which isn't great, but DL is quite good with mods compared to any other company using generic fixtures). However, Dominica Lifts has gone downhill recently. A lot of DL modernisations nowadays tend to use Dewhurst/Everbright/Shanghai STEP fixtures, and this makes the elevator(s) appear very cheap. However, often the motor and logic is DL’s own, and are usually very reliable. This is why, despite being generic, a lot of elevator enthusiasts find Dominica Lifts to be pretty reasonable (certainly better compared to any other generic). 2020–present At the beginning of 2020, Dominica Lifts bought over Q3, and work to replace every single Q3 elevator (except for the ones in Econesia until further notice) is in progress. 2020 is also the year where DL announced some new buttons to extend the current black-lozenge button fixture line. Buttons can now come in white, red, yellow, and blue illumination (to add to the green illumination that they have had since the 1990’s). Buttons can also now come with optional braille pattern below or beside the character(s). This is not possible on the touch-sensitive variant — instead braille marks are placed beside the button, either on the panel or on a separate tactile block. The first elevators known to have these new buttons is Orto City Entertainment Centre in Mitsubishiville — the elevators up to Action! Cinema have braille buttons with red illumination. Reliability Dominica Lifts elevators are very reliable, one of the longest-lasting generic elevators in the world. Their lifts are known to last a maximum of 25 years. At their worst, DL elevators still manage to survive at least 5-6 years. A lot of elevators under DL maintenance last reasonably long and usually get fixed within 24 hours of them breaking. Although some of their mods using other generic fixtures (i.e. Dewhurst, Everbright etc.) don't last as long as their “real” elevators with their own fixture line �� Notable installations Planet Elevator Linevettro Mitsubishiville * Jensen Plaza (South Carpark lifts, modded 2012 from Schindler M-Series) * Carlucci Mall (Farmers lift, installed 2009) * 46 Polaris Rd (installed 1994, modded 2016, modernisation from 90’s DL, Mitsubishiville’s first DLTSDD ['D'ominica 'L'ifts 'T'ouch's'''creen '''D'estination 'D'ispatch] system) * NSK Trade City (service lift, installed 1983) * Farmers Westinghouse Lane (modded 2005 from Mitsubishi) * Novotel+, Sun Terrace (all lifts, modded 2018 from 60’s OTIS) * Novotel, Sun Terrace (all lifts, modded 2018 from 60’s OTIS) * Novotel Shopping Arcade, Sun Terrace (modded 2018 from Schindler R-Series) * Tower 3, Horace Upp Towers (installed 2006) * Mitsubishiville Central Hospital (Red, Purple & Black lifts, modded 2004) * Concave Street Carpark (replaced 2012/13 from 60’s OTIS) * Orto City Entertainment Centre (installed 2010) * FOUR4 Apartments (Tower 6. Officially named the “worst DL elevator in the world”. '''Hydraulic.) New Auckland * New Auckland Plaza Shopping Centre (installed 1986, main lifts modded 2010) * Gass House (installed 1996) * Princess Arcade (main lift modded 2019 from Schindler EuroLift) Others * SilverStar Train Station (modded 2009 from Schindler M-Series) Econesia BayTown * Block 1-3, Kwai Fong Estate (Replaced from 1992 OTIS, the tallest Dominica Lifts installation in Econesia. Serving 39 storeys.) * Central Building (Replaced from 1984 Dong Yang lifts.) * Block 5-10, Lai Shing Estate (Replaced from 1988 TOSHIBA, the second tallest Dominica Lifts installation in Econesia. Serving 31 storeys.) * Block A-B, Upper Sham Shui Wan (1) Estate (Modernized from 1975 Schindler, the third tallest Dominica Lifts installation in Econesia. Serving 26 storeys.) Townstead * Monty Plaza (Replaced from 1982 OTIS.) Category:Fictional Companies